the ultimate war
by Radstrike
Summary: The Voldemort vs. Harry war just got bigger. Two Dark Jedi allied themselves with Voldy and plan to rule the universe. D. Vader must kill them and L. Skywalker is tasked with the killing of the Sith Lord. The galaxy soon becomes a massive battleground.
1. Chapter 1: Harry

**(Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or his companions; I don't own Darth Vader and his companions; I don't own the Stargate or its stuff; I don't own Jason Bourne; not that he's going to be in this but anyway; I don't own nuthin'! Well I do own a mysterious character that will appear later on in the story, but I'll tell you when he comes in. In short, I don't own, Harry Potter; Star Wars; Stargate; ect. If you recognize it, I don't own it.)**

**(Warning: In this fic I intend to totally disrupt timelines, storylines, etc. Very little will be according to their stories because I will change them. So you might say I own the story line. I think. Be prepared for the wildest mix-up of sci-fi!) **

**(a/n: I've been getting quite a few hits for this first chapter recently, but not so much for the other ones. Please, read on! I didn't think that the story was that bad; if it was, tell me! Just click the little 'submit review' button on the bottom and tell me what's wrong. I'll try to revise it if enough people think it's that bad!)**

**I recently recieved a 'review' from an anonymous person who said I should have mentioned in my summary that this is going to be a Harry/Hermione match-up of sorts. Anyone who has posted a story will agree with me when I say that the number of characters gives for a summary is really low. I didn't think that it was important enough to delete anything essential just to say it; to tell you the truth, it really has not much bearing on the story. It will pop up every now and then, but it does not progress the tale much at all. So, I am not going to put it in the summary and I am not going to change it. You will notice it maybe, three times in the duration of this fic. I plan on it being a long story.**

(Scene: two years after Harry, Hermione, and Ron have left Hogwarts. Harry has become the head of the anti-Voldemort task-force. So much popular support had been granted to him however, that the position of Minister of Magic is nothing more than a ritual position; almost everything has to go through Harry. Popular rumor has it that the ministry is poised to grant dictatorship to Harry; they simply do not want to deal with the paperwork necessary to support a war and two leaders at thesame time. Many of Harry's close friends have become generals in the task-force, due to their experience previously against the Death Eaters. At present Harry his sitting in his office, listening to a messenger tell about the latest battle. The messenger begins the conversation.)

Bowing, the messenger begins his narrative. "Lord Potter; I regret to be the one to bring you this news, but it must be told. Not two hours ago we were apparently winning the battle; the Death Eaters were retreating, we had secured the muggle town, and we had even managed to wound Draco Malfoy. However, we had barely started to move forward when a cloaked figure strode out of the mist. His cloak was completely black, he was wearing some kind of body-armor, and he had a mask on. Not like the Death Eater masks, this one was much more impressive. Lady Hermione leapt forward to try to surprise him, but he was too quick. Before she was within twenty feet of him she was wrenched into the air. She started to grab her throat and we could see that she was choking. The scary thing is that _he didn't have a wand._ Lord Neville fired a stunning spell at him but he raised his hand and sucked it in. Luckily he was distracted enough that he dropped Lady Hermione. Then he caught sight of Lord Lupin directing the battle and he pulled out a silver cylinder at least ten inches long.

He pushed a button and a red beam of light shot out of one end. He proceeded to cut down eleven wizards on his way to Lupin, but a squad led by Luna Lovegood and Lord Ronald managed to stop him. Their onslaught was large enough to make him retreat, but during his attack enough off our best fighters had been distracted that we lost the town."

He stopped talking. Harry leapt forward and grabbed the man by the front of his shirt. Shaking him violently, he roared,

"What of Hermione? Is Hermione alright? What is her condition?" He dropped the wizard.

The messenger stood up, dusted himself off, and bowed. "Forgive me Lord Potter. I should have remembered that you would want to know about Hermione. She is in stable condition and they are bringing her back to headquarters for treatment. They should be here within five minutes. Here is the collected memory of the battle." He handed a small crystal jar filled with a silvery substance to Harry.

Harry to it and sat down tiredly. "Sorry about my outburst. Thank you for your information. You're dismissed."

The messenger bowed again and departed.

Harry leaned back in his chair, reached into a desk drawer and pulled out an empty miniature pensieve. He poured the liquid into the bowl and poked it a few times with his wand until it came the right point. He watched the scene of the cloaked figure.

It was exactly as the messenger had reported it. He picked up the bowl carefully and carried it over to a shelf. These shelves stretched around three sides of the room, stacked four high. Every six inches or so, there was another pensieve. They were all showing similar scenes.

Harry stepped to look at them. He had collected a large collection of theses sightings over the past six months. Remarkably there was not one single mention of these beings before six months ago. Through much observation Harry had come to realize that there were either two, or one had a split personality. Their very attitude showed different aspects of life. One wore a cloak with a slightly different cut; one had a silver light cylinder that was significantly longer than the other, and it let beams of light come out from both ends; most importantly, the one with the double blade would leap right into the heart of action and begin cutting people down, the other preferred to stay near the edge of the battle and throw spells around.

Harry had to assume that the silver cylinders contained their wands; they couldn't do the things they did without magic, could they?

Harry whipped himself around. He strode to his closet and pulled out a cloak, much like the ones his new enemies wore. In the past few months he had taken to imitating his enemies' style of dress, military posture, and method of walking. He wanted to make his people feel like they had a counterpart to this new threat. They certainly needed it. Since the figures had started appearing, the win/loss ratio was falling horribly towards the lost side. Every time recently when the Order of the Phoenix had been close to winning a battle with few casualties, the figures would show up, either making the win so horrible that the Order might as well have lost, or turning the victory into a smashing defeat. The only weakness that these figures had shown so far was a shocking inability to apparate. Unfortunately, there just weren't enough wizards in the task force to put an end to these monsters. He could only assume that they were the product of some dark alchemy of Voldemort's. No matter. If they were to be killed, there was no need to know in what manner they had been created. Harry realized that he was thinking in a lazy manner, but in a way, the war had changed him.

At the beginning, Harry had devoted himself to all sorts of information, attempting to understand everything that Voldemort did. Now he had simply come to accept that Voldemort was a perpetual mystery, and one of the few creatures that can best be studied when they are extinct. As a result, Harry had stopped trying to learn the Dark Arts and simply devoted himself to destroy them. At one time, there was a point when many believed that Harry could one day become as strong as Dumbledore himself; but that time was long gone.

When Dumbledore had died, he had taken a massive amount of learning, known only to him, to the grave. That much information could not be gathered in an ordinary lifetime. If Dumbledore had even attempted to pass on even a little amount of his knowledge to Harry, Harry could already be the most powerful wizard alive, instead of being second best. But Dumbledore, the old fool, had chosen to be secretive, to pass on very little at a time. Because of his stupidity, Dumbledore quite possibly had doomed the world to suffer the tyranny of Voldemort in command. Harry had to admit, however, Dumbledore had left clues to the location of three of the Horcruxes. Whether these were the only ones Dumbledore knew of, Harry did not know.

The clues left behind certainly helped, and those three horcruxes were all that Harry had been able to find. The total now was three horcruxes waiting to be destroyed. Harry would have to look for them later.

Despite the fact that if Harry met Voldemort he would get crushed, many people still believed that Harry could fight Voldemort one-on-one and win. Harry knew this wasn't possible; but he held a wild card that Voldemort would never stoop to using. In his belt Harry kept a weapon that could silence the Dark Lord with a bang. The great thing was that Voldemort would never see it coming. Also, those .50 caliber bullets would do some serious damage to any organic being. Harry had personally seen what destruction his Desert Eagle could wreck on humans; there had been a particularly nasty fight with odds about ten-to-one on the Death Eaters' side. Harry had begun learning how to use muggle weapons after he had seen a squad of muggle marines kill ten Death Eaters with very few casualties. It was an added bonus that Lucious Malfoy had been in charge of that group of Death Eaters.

Hagrid had once remarked on the effectiveness of muggle weapons. "There's nothing like a muggle weapon to cause loads of pain and sorrow, 'Arry. Those there muggles come up with things to make the Imperious Curse look pale. I mean, you-know-who can kill a person with a spell, but the muggles once built a bomb that killed thousands all at once. Very nasty. Then they also have all sorts of diseases in little glass bottles. If they let any of those break, not even Dumbledore could have stopped the epidemics that foller. Never underestimate a muggle. They could come in handy."

Hagrid had been right. Many Death Eaters had been killed by muggle soldiers before they had taken them seriously. After Voldemort had brought the wizarding world into sight of the muggle community, entire nations had joined either Harry or the Death Eaters. Luckily the United States, Briton, and Germany had hastened to join Harry. It really wasn't too hard to convince the U.S.; they had a science fiction addict for president at the time.

Harry had to admit; the muggle weapons and soldiers were all better than the wizards. The soldiers, especially the ones they called the Seals, were adept at infiltration and execution. There had been many missions that would have failed miserably without muggle support.

Even the underworld had proven useful. Voldemort's repulsion of muggles was to the extent that he would not talk to one without the muggle on his knees after giving an oath to serve Voldemort without question. This had caused many shady characters to offer their services to Harry; for a price of course.

He strode down the hallway. If they were bringing Hermione to headquarters, they would go straight to the hospital wing.

Therefore, Harry went to the hospital. Once he got there, he found it in a state of orderly chaos. One of the healers hurried over to him. Headquarters had the finest expertise in the whole world. One of the Death Eaters' first targets had been St. Mungo's.

"Sir; Hermione is in the bed over in the far corner. She's now recovering; it didn't take long to treat her throat, but I think you should see this." Harry was led over to a bed. "This is one of the victims of the attack of the Dark Knight," she said.

Harry glared at her.

"Who's the Dark Knight?"

"I'm sorry sir; the Dark Knight is what many people are calling that dreadful apparition on the battlefields. Anyway, look at these wounds." Harry bent down and saw a horribly precise and equal cut running along the man's chest. There was a distinct smell of scorched flesh in the air. The wound was already cauterized. Harry turned to look at the healer, who was practically shivering.

"Who cauterized this wound?" he asked her accusingly. "Did you?"

"Oh no sir; that was the way the wound was found. We think it was made with that red beam the Dark Knight waves around."

"Why was I never told of this?"

"We have never before been able to recover victims, sir."

Harry thought back. It dawned on him that this statement was true. After every time the figures showed up the Order had had to make a hasty retreat, both in triumph and defeat.

"We can do nothing for these patients."

Harry turned and hurried to Hermione's bedside. Remarkably she was awake.

"How are you feeling, Hermione?" asked Harry.

"A little embarrassed, I suppose."

Harry was puzzled. "There's no dishonor in being beaten by those monsters. It's tribute to your strength and courage that you even attempted to stop them."

"Oh, I'm not embarrassed about that, Harry. It's just that a little while ago Ron came in and told me that he didn't really want to be with me. He said that he loves Luna. The funny thing is, I've known for a least a year that I didn't want to spend my life with him. It was simply animal attraction. I just didn't want to hurt his feelings. Ron has the emotional level of a biscuit, and I didn't want to scare him away from getting to know anyone else.

"I don't want a short relationship filled with passion, Harry. I want to spend my time with someone I know that I can live with. Someone that I can raise children with. That's the whole point of marriage anyway. Ron thinks so too, on a more instinctive level. I'm not sure if he is capable of such in-depth thought.

"I'm kind of embarrassed that we continued to go out on dates for so long even though we didn't want to be with each other."

"Why are you telling me this? Isn't this very private?" asked Harry, although he sincerely hoped that he knew the answer.

"Don't you see, Harry? I want to be with you. I think that together we can be happy."

Harry hugged her. He whispered in her ear. "I love you Hermione. I think subconsciously I have always loved you. My other crushes, Cho and Ginny, were just teenage hormones running rampant. Now I've gotten older and a little wiser, and I want to be with you too."

Hermione hugged him back. "I know."

Harry jumped. "How could you know?"

Hermione smirked. "Well, it's been blindingly obvious to everyone for a long while. Almost everyone in the building knew except you and me."

Harry smiled. "I love you Hermione."

"I love you too."

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**Author's note: I have been recieving more than double the hits on this page than I have on the next chapter, and the number of hits gets progressively less. I realize that a good number of people probably open this story and close it in disgust instantly while the true readers read to the end. Thank You everyone who have read the whole story so far!**

**If you have a complaint, simply write a review; tell me what you don't like. I'd greatly appreciate that. Thank you!**

**A/N: the formatting on the next few chapters is a little off and I am in the process of fixing it. Thank you for your time and patience. I know that there is nothing more annoying than an author who has a good story but cannot format their own page. **


	2. Chapter 2: Mara

**(Disclaimer: In this chapter, if you recognize it, I still don't own it. G. Lucas owns Star Wars, JK Rowling owns Harry Potter. My special character still hasn't shown up yet.)**

Section 2

Meanwhile, thousands of light years away, a grey, triangle shaped, massive ship floated peacefully in space. It was over a mile long, with numerous weapon hardpoints dotting the surface. It exuded the feel of invincible power, of strength too massive to comprehend.

It was not alone.

The Kuat Drive Yards Imperial-Class Mark II Star Destroyer was merely one out of thirty that surrounded the planet below. With its planetary shields, ground based ion cannons and turbolasers, numerous Golan-Class Defensive Battle Platforms, the space fleet, and thousands of smaller frigates; Coruscant is one of the most heavily defended planets in the galaxy.

On the surface itself, there resides one of the most heavily guarded buildings in the galaxy. The Imperial Palace is a massive complex, over one mile long at certain points. One might think that the extra size might propose more of a security risk; but this is not true. Oh no, the more space you have, the more Imperial Stormtroopers you can fit in.

One of the most heavily guarded rooms in the galaxy is on Coruscant and in the Imperial Palace. This room is known as the Imperial Throne Room. Many people have gone in; few come out. Those that do come out depart ridiculously rich and satisfied. Those that don't, well, we won't mention them. On this particularly fine day (all days are fine on Coruscant; there is precious little moisture left in the atmosphere), a particularly striking red haired woman is walking into the Throne Room. As the Emperor's Hand, she has no fear of execution; her last ten missions have been utterly successful.

Five malcontent senators completely annihilated, one rebel cell leader captured and tortured, three saboteurs apprehended and strapped to their own activated bombs (The Emperor had been especially pleased with that mission), and one jedi killed.

Not bad for a month.

Mara Jade knelt before Emperor Palpatine. "You summoned me, my master. What is your command?" The Emperor turned to her from his position beside the window. "Ah, my loyal servant; there is a certain planet on the far flung edges of the galaxy know as Earth. This Earth has been charted, but only a few have ever landed on the surface. The planet itself is so backward that they are barely reaching into space. They count it as an accomplishment if they can put a satellite in orbit around their planet.

"However, some of my Dark Jedi have rebelled and fled to this planet. My spies have reported that they have joined forces with a man named Voldemort, who is now styling himself a Dark Lord. There can be only two Dark Lords at a time!" his voice dropped to a snarl. "I do not like deserters, I do not like rebellions," his voice reach a crescendo, "and I most especially despise Sith imposters!

"Your mission is to go to this planet, kill the Dark Jedi, and kill this 'Lord Voldemort' in a suitably painful way."

Mara Jade raised an eyebrow. "What are my assets for this mission master? Wouldn't a Star Destroyer do a better job than I?"

The Emperor took his time in answering. "I want this planet to realize the existence of other beings very slowly. This planet is one of the few that I feel will have a major effect in the future. Also, this is a stealth mission. If we just bomb them out of existence, we cannot be sure we hit them. Whereas, it you kill them quietly, and see the bodies, we will be sure. You will have not support from the army either, so you must be prepared for anything. Is that understood?"

"Yes, Master."

"Be careful; I have reason to believe that these Dark Jedi have found certain recordings from Darth Revan and Darth Bane. As such, they could be potentially more dangerous than anyone you have ever faced."

"I will do my best."

"I expect nothing less. You are dismissed."

Mara strode out of the Throne Room. She nodded to the next person in line; a small man who was pale and shaking. She continued down the corridor. Her meeting with the Emperor had gone remarkably well. Judging by the screams coming from down the hallway, the little pale man wasn't so lucky. No matter. If the Emperor wanted to punish someone, that was his business.

She marched up to the armory door. She pulled out her comlink and requested a small inconspicuous scout ship, fully provisioned. After receiving an affirmative, she held out her security card to the stormtrooper at the door. He took it, swiped it through the card reader, and handed it back to her. She walked past him and froze while several different scanners checked her out. Having received a pass, she walked in and selected several items. One blaster, one dart launcher, twenty paralysis darts, two frag grenades, one concussion grenade, one thermal detonator, and a survival kit. Moving to a console, she checked her selection out of the inventory.

One quick walk later and she was onboard her scout ship. Coruscant Security gave her the heads up, and she left the system.

Mara Jade came out of hyperspace a safe distance away from earth. Observing it, she realized that earth was one of the more…normal planets she had seen. She activated her sensor jammer and dove towards the surface. Luckily she was on the night side and was not visually observed. Mara headed for the coordinates the Emperor had given her. As she got closer, she realized that these coordinates were located on a small island. She was puzzled. Why fight for such a little area when they could take the large continent on the left or right? What was so important that they had to fight on such a small area? The ship continued in. She landed in a deserted field of some kind of grass. Opening the hatch, she grabbed her backpack and climbed out.

Scarcely had she planted her feet on the ground when her danger sense went wild. Mara dived into a tight roll and came up behind a wing. The air was filled with what looked like blaster bolts; that couldn't be right, the Emperor had said that this planet was technologically backwards; where did they get blasters? She focused, expanding her sphere of awareness. Within a second she realized that there were at least twenty beings and one dark shadow in the force that could only be one of the rouge Jedi. Another second and she had established that these beings were all concentrated in one spot, heading towards her. They were certainly amateur; no military force in the galaxy would make such a mistake. She armed a frag grenade and tossed it into the concentration. The dark spot yelled a warning.

"Get out of the way! That's a grenade!"

Alas, it was too late. The grenade detonated, killing ten instantly and fatally wounding another five. Mara pulled out her blaster and leaped out from behind the wing. She triggered three shots in quick succession while she was in the air and managed to hit one man. He went down screaming. As he fell she rolled and came up with her blaster pointing at the next two men. One was only another of those strange fighters, the other was the shadowy figure she felt. As soon as she saw him she knew this was one of the Dark Jedi. He moved his hand and her blaster flew from her grip, despite the efforts she made to retain it, both physically and through the Force. She tried to get away but he grabbed her in the force and held her tight.

She realized that this Jedi had definitely found the lost teachings of Revan. For one, the armor he was wearing was reminiscent of the great Sith Lord, right down to the Revan-style helmet. Also, none of the Dark Side adepts were ever trained to this level; only through dedicated individual training could have turned this weakling into such a powerful being.

Her last thought was punctuated by pain as the Jedi ripped her belt and holster from around her waist; her bandolier from around her chest; and her dart launcher and her accompanying darts from separate parts of her body. Only then did he pull her towards them. The other man started to move towards the ship. The Dark Jedi was furious.

"Leave it, Draco!"

The other man ignored him and continued to move towards the ship. The Dark Jedi flew into a rage.

"I SAID LEAVE IT!"

Draco pointed his wand at the Jedi. "I don't take orders from you, Weirdo! I serve the Dark Lord!"

The Jedi didn't say anything, but Mara could feel the anger and hate rolling from him in waves. She was almost knocked unconscious from the sheer force of this man's hate. When he next spoke it was in a dangerously calm and reasonable voice. "I don't care who you serve, I told you to stay away from that ship and you will stay away from that ship."

Draco sneered. "Loosen up, mud-blood. I'm going. That that is the end of the discussion. Live with it." He resumed his walk towards the ship.

The Dark Jedi lost his temper. He completely blew his top. The explosion of Mt. St. Helen's paled in comparison. Draco was picked bodily up and flung against a tree. After being hit with a large jolt of electricity. The Dark Jedi would have done more, except that he suddenly remembered that he was holding Mara in the air and completely lost interest in Draco.

"Now, will you join me and help me gain control of this pathetic planet? I assure you however, this is not the extent of our plans. Oh no. After we control this planet we will make our move on more small time planets until we have enough resources to build ourselves a fleet. Our power shall grow and we will take on the Emperor himself! Will you join me?"

Mara spat. "Never! I serve the Emperor. Nothing you can do to me will change that! Nothing! You'll never defeat the Emperor!"

"Ah, loyalty. What a quaint and naïve emotion. Even so, loyalty directed towards the right person can be a powerful tool."

"I suppose you mean yourself."

"Of course."

"Go boil your head, laser-brain!"

"Ah, you're not going to make this easy, are you? Good. We want to have some fun." He snapped his fingers. "Come here."

At first Mara thought he was talking to her, and was about to start yelling about how ugly he was and insulting everything she could think of; but the other Dark Jedi came out of the woods. The one holding her pointed towards the ship.

"Take that and hide it in a cave. I don't care where the cave is, just hide it."

The other Dark Jedi moved off. Mara started to yell at him. "What kind of Dark Sider are you? Listening to his orders and docilely carrying them out? Where is your self respect?"

The one holding her looked bemused. She couldn't see his face of course, but his entire body spoke of bemusement. "How could I have forgotten my manners? This is my apprentice, Darth Mendax. Mendax, this is Mara Jade, the Emperor's Hand."

Darth Mendax bowed. When he spoke, his voice sounded like sandpaper. It was a sharp contrast to the other's smooth, honeyed tones. "It is indeed a pleasure, my lady."

Mara sneered. "The feeling is mutual, I'm sure," she replied, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

The other Jedi was pleased. "Excellent! My name is Darth Limin."

Mara spun on him. "Are you insane? There can be only two Dark Lords! Those positions are already filled!"

Limin didn't react. "Your Emperor and your Darth Vader are not true Sith. We are the true Sith. We have been trained in the Dark Side by Darth Revan himself. With the ancient Sith techniques, nothing will be able to stop us.

"Your pitiful excuses mean nothing to me. I am going to 'convince' you to join; one way or another."

"I'm trained to resist torture of all kinds, you immature oversized kriffing nerf-hearder! Do your worst." Mara said.

"Oh, don't worry, I will. Let's just take you back to our base." said Limin.

He stretched out his hand and blue lighting crackled from his fingers. In about a minute Mara was unconscious. Limin levitated her senseless body and moved off into the woods.

**(I won't post too often because I don't want to run out of my supply of chapters before I write more of them, so **

**I'll probably post about once a week. Review!)**


	3. Chapter 3: Torture

**

* * *

Disclaimer: I don't own it; otherwise I'd be very, very, very rich. Like G. Lucas. Or J.K. Rowling. **

**Section 3**

Mara woke in a small duracrete cell. At least she thought it was duracrete; on a planet this backward, they could still be using primitive concrete. Her attention wandered and she realized that her hands were bound behind her back and her feet were bound together. She had scarcely started to tug at her bounds before her attention wandered again. There was something on her face. There was something covering her entire head! Some kind of hood she supposed. In a moment of clarity she realized that these Dark Jedi must have found a rare Sith mask on Korriban. Certain types of Sith masks couldcause peoples' attentions to wander, keeping them from focusing either their energy or force power. She must be wearing one. Futilely she tried to concentrate, but she knew it was worthless. Her attention wandered again.

She wondered how long she had been unconscious; she wondered what these men wanted; she wondered what they were going to do to her. About twenty minutes later the door to her cell burst open and a woman swept in. "My name is not important to you at this time, so just listen to me and do as I tell you. Cooperate and things will go better. Come with me." She untied Mara's feet and yanked her upright. She pulled out a collar and snapped it around Mara's neck. If she had been in control of her body, Mara would have died before suffering such a humiliation. As it was however, she barely struggled. The mysterious woman snapped a chain on to the collar and dragged Mara out of the cell. After what seemed an eternity of walking they came to a thick door. There were two men guarding it. The man on the left spoke.

"Evenin', Bellatrix. Still tormenting helpless people, I see. What do you want?"

The woman Bellatrix snarled. "Shut up, Rodger. If there hadn't been so many of you noble-hearted Death Eaters last time, we wouldn't have lost!"

"Yeah, well, if your precious 'Dark Lord' would let us quit, we wouldn't be in your way!" snarled Roger. The instant the words left his mouth he knew it was a big mistake.

"That's treason, Roger, and you know it," hissed Bellatrix as she started forward, her wand raised.

Roger stepped back. "I take it back! I'm sorry, Bellatrix! Please don't mention this to the Dark Lord! I'll do anything!"

Bellatrix sniffed and returned her wand to some hidden pocket in her cloak. "I'll forget it this time, Roger. But remember, I will not let this pass unnoticed. I will collect this favor sometime in the future."

Roger let out a sigh of relief. "Thank you! I will pay you back."

Mara was so shocked that she was able to throw off the effects of the Sith Mask for a short time. "You're going to let him go? He is a dissenter and should be removed! By all rights you should kill him right now. He spoke out against your leader! Kill him."

Bellatrix adopted a thoughtful look on her face. "Maybe I should kill him," she said. "That would grant me certain favor with the Dark Lord."

Roger turned pale and stepped back again. "No, Bellatrix, please…" He bumped into the wall behind himself.

Bellatrix laughed. "Then again, it is always good to have contingency plans."

Mara was stunned. "What? If you don't trust your master, that makes you just as much a rebel as the last man." The Mask cut in again and she lost her train of thought. However, she was now mentally strong enough to hold onto part of the thought.

"Traitor!" she screamed. "TRAITOR! YOU ARE A KRIFFING TRAITOR!"

Bellatrix sighed. "I see I have to take care of your memories first." She pointed her wand at Mara and initiated a Memory Charm. The charm hit, and then it was blocked by a mental wall so powerful that the spell was simply deflected. Bellatrix tried again, and again, _and_ again. Finally she gave up and looked at Mara. Mara was grinning foolishly and was clearly disoriented by the amount of strength necessary to stop such a spell.

"Hee, hee," she giggled. "Not so easy to wipe my mind, is it Bellatrix? I've been trained to fight that stuff. I remember everything."

Bellatrix was stunned. No one in the history of magic had ever resisted the Memory Charm. She realized that there was only one way to stop Mara from babbling to Voldemort. Actually, there was two ways; but Voldemort wanted to talk to a live Mara. She pulled out her wand and pointed it at Roger. Mara giggled.

"That's the way, that's the way," she tittered.

Roger started begging for his life, but Bellatrix couldn't risk it.

"AVADA KEDAVRA!" she yelled.

Roger collapsed on the ground in a flash of green light. In her near hysterical state Mara promptly forgot about the incident.

She descended into her thoughts and struggled along behind Bellatrix. The duo headed down the passageway after going through the door. Soon enough they came to another door. This door seemed to be made of some sort of stone, but in her hysterically induced state Mara was in no shape to change a light bulb, much less ascertain the elemental nature of a strange door. However, it made no difference. Mara was dragged through into the room beyond. Bellatrix stopped and yanked the hood off of Mara's head. Mara's concentration returned in a rush. Her hysteria disappeared as well.

She lunged at Bellatrix. Bellatrix clicked her tongue and pointed her piece of wood at Mara. A light leapt out of it and Mara was frozen to the spot. She snarled and twisted to no avail. Bellatrix laughed and waved her wand again. Against her will, Mara was dragged to a low table in the center of the room. A quick glance around the room told Mara that she was in a pretty typical interrogation room, made popular throughout the galaxy during the Emperor's reign.

Bellatrix slammed Mara down on the table and clipped her collar onto a waiting loop of steel. She then proceeded to secure Mara on the table by her hands and feet using chains. After Bellatrix was finished she simply left through the door, leaving Mara behind.

Mara tried to struggle but the chains were too strong and her force power not yet fully returned. Finally she slumped back in defeat. There was nothing left to do but wait.

A very long time later the door opened. Mara had lost track of how long she was in the room. She was completely disoriented. She quickly organized her thoughts. First she had landed. When she had debarked, she had been ambushed. The ambushers had been using some sort of strange weapons; the lights resembled blaster bolts, but they were fired from pieces of wood. Obviously she would have to figure that mystery later. After she had incapacitated or killed the other men, the Dark Jedi had grabbed her. He claimed that he was a true Sith, ready to take on the galaxy. Apparently he wanted to assist the 'Dark Lord' of this planet. He would probably want to take over and use these people to conquer neighboring systems.

Then she had been bound and secured and now she was strapped to a table awaiting interrogation.

The door opened fully; in walked one of the strangest men Mara had ever seen. In a way, he reminded her of Palpatine; he was definitely different from other humans, his skin was a pale gray color, and his eyes were strange. However, this man had red eyes, whereas the Emperor had yellow. She instantly knew that this was a man of great power and almost infinite cruelty.

The man spoke.

"My dear; you are awake. Good; I have proposal to make to you: join me. That is all. Join me and you will be well rewarded. You will be given the position of…uh…what would you call it…in nautical terms; second mate, if you will."

Mara sneered. "Second Mate? What do you think I am, some sort of person who can be bought? I serve the Emperor and nothing you can do to me will change my mind. Do your worst!"

The spooky man sighed. "Oh, well. They said you wouldn't give in right away, but I had to try. It's so much quicker if you would just give in now. Since you won't join, we will have to do this the hard way. Remember: what I am about to do to you is not to gain information. You have nothing in your mind that I wish to hear. All I want is your loyalty. The instant you pledge fealty to me, I release you. I even know certain spells that will instantly heal your wounds. However, we don't have much time; I must get to work."

He walked much closer to the table and leaned down next to Mara's ear.

"My dear, what I am about to show you is only an example of what I can do. But, before I show you, I want to do this."

He then gagged her. "That is to keep the screaming down to a minimum. It gives me such a headache. By the way, my name is Voldemort; shall we begin, Mara Jade, Hand of the Emperor?"

He pointed his stick at Mara. "CRUCIO!" he yelled.

Mara was consumed in a world of agony. Everything was white. Pain was all there was; a universe of suffering; unending torment. At the apex of her torment, the ultimate point, just before her mind was destroyed and she descended into the dark oblivion of insanity, Voldemort stopped torturing her, almost as if he knew when she would snap. She fell back onto the table gasping; she wanted to pass out, but her training prevented her from doing so. Voldemort leaned in.

"That, my precocious little girl, is a small example of what I can do."

Mara was in incredible pain, but she still managed to force a tiny laugh. "Small example? I'd hate to feel your best."

Voldemort smiled. "You will never feel that, my pretty, if you turn to me. However, if you take to much time to turn, I will be forced to show you the true extent. Trust me, I can make your end go much more slowly than you could think possible. Regardless, for now we will focus on more…traditional methods."

He clapped his hands and two burly men came into the room.

"Don't kill her," he snarled at them.

The two men cracked their knuckles in delight.

"No, sir," they chorused.

Voldemort sniffed. "Be sure that you don't, Crabbe, Goyle. I'd hate to do to you what I did to your fathers. I'll be back in an hour. You had better have her sobbing, and she better not be dead." He swept from the room to take care of more important things, even if they weren't as enjoyable.

Mara looked Crabbe and Goyle up and down; they resembled shaved apes with their massive torsos and arms. Their heads were small however and they didn't look like they did much thinking for themselves. On the other hand, their faces showed that they had a penchant for cruelty. All together it was a bad combination for the subject of interrogation.

"Let's begin, shall we?" chortled Goyle. He picked up a cat-o'-nine tail; Crabbe yanked it from his hands.

"You idiot! We can't kill her, the Dark Lord said so. How long do you think she would last if you start beating her with that?"

Goyle looked longingly at the nails and spikes braided into the cat-o'-nine, and then looked up. "You have a point Crabbe.

How 'bout torches? They don't leave no permanent damage, do they?"

Crabbe smiled wickedly. "Torches sound great. Get 'um."

Goyle chuckled again and plucked a couple from the wall.

"Here you go," he said tossing one to Crabbe.

Crabbe held the torch inches away from Mara's stomach. "Should we do it with her clothes on, or off?"

Goyle thought for a minute. "Let's do it with them on. Then they can burn off. That should be fun to see."

They applied the torches to different parts of her body. Crabbe held the torch to her stomach while Crabbe held it to her legs. After a few minutes they realized that it wasn't working.

'Stupid people,' thought Mara. Imperial space-rated jumpsuits were naturally complete protection against extreme heat and cold, and even to a small extent resistant to shrapnel. There was no way they were going to be able to burn through it with a few measly torches.

Crabbe and Goyle realized this a little later. They grunted in disgust and went to rip the jumpsuit off her. However, with their massive fingers they were unable to grasp the tiny zipper that secured the suit. Crabbe made a disappointed noise and went to find some scissors.

When he came back, he was holding two large pairs; one for him and one for Goyle. They immediately began cutting. The armor mesh holding the suit together managed to resist them for a while, but eventually it gave way, little by little. Within ten minutes the scraps of the jumpsuit were lying on the floor and Mara was left clad in her flight suit; which was by no means fireproof. It was a partial body suit, completely covering her upper body, her arms down to her elbows, and down her legs to the knees. The result was that all that was uncovered was her forearms and lower legs. The two also yanked off her boots and her socks, inadvertently finding the small hold-out blaster concealed there. By unspoken agreement, Goyle and Crabbe held the lit torches simultaneously to the soft, sensitive flesh on the bottom of her feet. The pain once again filled her to bursting.

Hours later she was tossed unceremoniously into her cell once more, to find that most of her gear had been tossed in as well.

Although she knew that it was probably what they wanted, she struggled over to her bag and pulled out a first aid kit. She began to administer to the bruises that she had sustained during the hours of the breaking; paying special attention the bottom of her feet. The Bacta spray and the synthi-flesh bandages took the pain down to tolerable level, but she knew that it would be a while before she put her boots back on.

She sat down on her cot, head in hands. What was she to do? She couldn't even use the Force; she had been administered a drug that apparently subdued the use of the force for at least three days with so extra side effects. The hypodermic needle from whence the drug was injected not only looked unsanitary, it looked like it had been taken from a couple thousand year old crypt; which it probably had, if it came from Korriban as she expected.

She ransacked her belongings again. There was no weapon anywhere; they had even taken the portable holo-vid player. It looked like it was going to be a long wait.

**(Review please! I'd like to know what my readers think about my story!)**


	4. Chapter 4: Dungeouns and Assassins

**(Disclaimer: I don't own any of this and I am not making any money)**

**Section 4**

Harry marched down to the detention center. Since the Demontors had deserted their duties, high security prisoners were

kept at headquarters; possibly the most secure facility in the world. Not only was the Headquarters protected by almost

every defensive spell known to wizardkind, it was also defended by the highest security muggles could install. The automated

alarm systems and self locking doors might not keep Death Eaters out, but they sure did a wonderful job slowing them down.

That is, if they managed to get to the front door. The headquarters was magically transported to one of seven different spots

in the globe every three days. The rotation was completely random and even Harry had no idea which place they were going

to. Each location was protected with the Fidelus Charm and each had its own Secret Keeper; they were also defended by

dedicated weapons systems. Harry had taken a clue from Hogwarts and placed an anti-apperating spell over the entire

headquarter facility and grounds. The area outside the apperating-free zone was a treacherous minefield on the most literal

sense of the word. Anyone veering off the proper course would be suitably demolished by almost every type of mine created

by man. Muggles had also placed the headquarter's locations under no-fly zones and the places were defended by anti-

aircraft guns.

One muggle had revealed a new technology to Harry. This weapon was made by a company known as Metal Storm. These

weapons were incredible. Although they were only in the late stages of development, Metal Storm were capable of firing

over one million rounds a minute; this was because the only moving part of the gun was the projectile, launched by an

electronic pulse. They had positioned four Metal Storm weapons around the perimeter of each location.

All together the effect was that the headquarters was nigh impossible to approach unless you were friendly or if you were

bulletproof, fireproof, missile proof, shrapnel proof, spell proof, and just about every other proof in the world.

At present the headquarters were resting inside the Sphinx in Egypt. Contrary to popular belief, the Sphinx and the three

nearby pyramids were not of wizard design. Rather, it was supposed that the four constructs were of far more ancient and

distant engineering. Unknown to most of the population of Earth, a scientist by the name of Daniel Jackson recently

proposed a theory that the pyramids were made by a powerful, ancient space-going race of aliens. After he had gone

through the mysterious golden circle known as the StarGate, he had revised his theory; the aliens in particular were simply

thralls in the mighty Empire of Ra. Even now Daniel was spitting nails that a bunch of 'stuffed up loonies' were being allowed

to park their operation smack-dab in the middle of what might be the most powerful section of Earth. Daniel believed that if

the three pyramids could be're-activated' an ancient power would be revealed; a power that could save mankind from

destroying itself.

The governments were not to be persuaded however, and Harry, technologically deficient as always, was not about to give up one of his precious locations because of some theory.

Now he was strolling down several flights of steps and through numerous levels of guards, some human, most not. In the

deepest, most secure section Harry stopped before a certain cell.

"How are you, Mundungus?" he asked offhandedly. A sallow-faced man struggled to the grating and peered out. Harry had

never forgiven Mundungus for looting Sirius' house before he was ten hours dead, and as a result, Harry had brought

Mundungus from Azkaban and placed him in the darkest, moldiest cell he could find.

Mundungus squinted at Harry. "What you doin' here?" he asked.

Harry smiled in a winning way. "Oh nothing really. I just wanted to tell you what a wonderful day it is outside. Oh, wait a

minute, you don't know where you are…for all you know, the temperature could be pleasant, or it could be a scorching one

hundred twenty degrees Fahrenheit. Perhaps it is negative thirty degrees with the wind chill. You simply never will know."

"Leave me alone. I don't owe you anything," he snarled at Harry.

Harry's eyes grew cold. "On the contrary. I spared your life, you owe me that. Oh yes, I spared you again, getting you out

of Azkaban. Not that this place is an improvement, but at least there aren't any Death Eaters trying to break in." his temper

began to rise. "YOU DECIDED TO GO THROUGH SIRIUS' STUFF BEFORE HE WAS GONE FOR A DAY! YOU

DIDN'T EVEN HAVE THE DECENCY TO WAIT A LITTLE! ONE WEEK MIGHT HAVE BEEN FINE, THEN

YOU WOULD HAVE BEEN STEALING FROM THE ORDER AND THAT WOULDN'T HAVE BEEN SO BAD,

BUT NOOO. YOU HAD TO GO AND SNITCH IT RIGHT AWAY! LUCKY FOR YOU THAT THE MINISTRY

CAUGHT YOU, 'CAUSE I PROBABLY WOULD HAVE KILLED YOU ON THE SPOT, YOU FILTHY LITTLE

CROOK! I THINK YOU OWE ME A WHOLE HECK OF A LOT!"

Mundungus flinched. "Look, Harry, I didn't know that you would take it so personally. If I had, I woulda' waited."

Harry regained control and calmed down dramatically. "No you wouldn't have, that's the way you are." He sighed

dejectedly.

Mundungus perked up at this spark of hope. "Yeah, that's the way I am, I can't help it. Sorry Harry. Will you forgive me?"

he adopted a completely false expression of innocence, which apparently Harry saw straight through, because he flamed up

again.

"NO I MOST CERTAINLY WILL NOT FORGIVE YOU FOR SOMETHING THAT YOU'RE NOT EVEN

BOTHERING TO FEEL SORRY FOR! THAT'S THE REASON THAT YOU'RE IN HERE, AND NOT IN A

LOWER SECURITY PRISON FOR PETTY THEFT! I WILL HOLD YOU IN HERE UNTIL THE DAY YOU

REPENT AND COMPLETELY ADMIT THAT YOU ARE A SKIVVING LITTLE CRIMINAL!"

When he finished Mundungus had already taken about three steps back into his cell. "Oh," he said simply. "What do you

want?"

Harry turned away from him. "I want to know which muggle assassin is the best in the business; also I want to know how to

contact him."

"And why should I tell you?" Mundungus asked in a surly voice.

Harry leaned against the wall, pulled out his wand and a rag, and began polishing his wand. "Well," he said. "No one in this

world would object to me…'interrogating' you. Who knows, you might be a Death Eater in disguise! And if you

mysteriously sustained certain wounds that wouldn't heal, no one would ask were they came from."

Mundungus stared at him in disbelief. "You wouldn't!"

Harry raised an eyebrow at him. "Are you really willing to gamble on it?"

"I can't believe that you would do something like that! You were once such a nice boy; what happened to you? Now you're

all nasty and cruel hearted."

Harry looked expressionlessly at him. "War can do that to you. Eventually you learn to trust very few people, and you care

for even less. Right now you fit into neither category. Now tell me!"

"Let me think, the best assassin in the business is…James Bourne."

Harry gaped at him. "What do you think you are talking about? Jason Bourne's not real; I read the books."

Mundungus giggled. "I know that; I was just kiddin' with you."

"Tell me now!" snarled Harry.

"Alright, alright; don't get your dandruff up, kid. The best in the business is a man named John."

"John?"

"Just John."

"His name is just John?"

"That's right, Just John."

"Doesn't he have a surname?"

"Yeah, it's John."

"What?"

"His name is Just. 'Just' as in Justice."

"This guy's name is seriously 'Just John'?"

"That's what he calls himself."

"Anyway," said Harry, "Names are not important; how do I contact this man?"

Mundungus looked thoughtful. "You have to go to a tattoo parlor in London called 'Draconis Maximus' and ask for the

proprietor. Slip him two hundred U.S. dollars and tell him that 'Bob the Bomb' sent you. He'll hold out his hand; slip him

another two hundred and say 'Lollipops'. He'll take you to the back room and show you a secret trap door. This will lead

you to an underground office, were you will meet John. The price will range anywhere from ten thousand to five hundred

thousand, depending on the job."

"Why dollars?" asked Harry. "Why not British pounds, or Euros?"

Mundungus leaned closer to Harry and whispered conspiratorially, "Between you and me, I think that he really works from

the U.S. I think that the man in the tattoo parlor is really a sham; a front for the real John."

Harry walked away. "Thanks 'Dung. You just saved yourself a hundred years in prison."

Mundungus looked up. "Really? You mean it? How long am I in here for?"

Harry didn't look back once. "Nine hundred years," he said without a hint of emotion.

Twenty-four hours later he was back in his office. For an underworld agent, John had been remarkably easy to contact and

hire; Harry had been told to expect results within a week. Now all he had to do was wait. The contract had been ridiculously

expense; twenty-five thousand U.S. dollars for each target, but then again, Harry hadn't asked him to do an easy task. He

didn't like hiring hit men, it went against his nature. Unfortunately a muggle assassin was probably their best hope for survival.

Two days from the contract date Harry didn't see anything of the cloaked figures for three days, even though there had been

two major battles in which the Order had triumphed decisively. Harry began to hope that his gamble might have paid back.

On the six day however, a six foot-by-three foot-by-two foot box was delivered to his office. It had come through the

magical P.O. Box which routed all their mail. On the top was pasted a letter. With shaking hands, Harry opened it. The

contents read thus:

"Dear Harry;

You have sent this pathetic being to murder us in ou

r beds. We do not take kindly to being murdered. It is such a…permanent position. Please do not attempt such a foolhardy

plan again. We would be most displeased. Enclosed is the hit man you sent to kill us. Much to our dismay he actually wou

nded us severely. We suspect he had inside help. During our period of recovery we missed two important battles thanks to

you; we will pass on our appreciation when we finally meet you in person.

Sincerely,

Us"

Harry dropped the letter feeling slightly nauseous, and very guilty. He knew what was in the box. He summoned an aide.

"Take this coffin and bury it in the graveyard; give it a full funeral with all the honors of a civilian fallen in our cause."

The aide bowed and, using a levitating charm, departed from the room.

Harry sat down. If these monsters were good enough to stop the best hit man that the muggles had, there was no way he

could. What should he do now? After a half hour of contemplation, he realized that there simply was nothing he could do.

With that thought in his mind, he dejectedly got up and headed for the war room. All that was possible was to commit

unacceptable numbers to attack the figures during the next battle. Or, he could utilize the 'Secret Weapons". That was an

idea. Harry had no idea whether or not they were ready yet, but he knew that they could be the Order's only hope over the

next year.

**Some friends of mine say that Harry's anger in the Order of the Phoenix was unreasonable; I think that it was **

**perfectly justified. I think he had a lot of control not to completly explode. That's what I think.**

**Just telling you my opinions.**

**Please, Review!**

**I didn't know why authors on would beg so hard for reviews, but now I know. I want to know what you think of it!**


	5. Chapter 5: Vader

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**

(Disclaimer: I don't own Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, James Bond, etc. I own a couple of pencils and some paper however…)

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**Section 5**

A tall figure, all covered in pitch black armor swept into the throne room and kneeled in front of the chair that was situated in the

middle of the room.

"You called, my master?" hissed the mechanically assisted voice of Darth Vader.

The chair slowly turned round. "Yes, Lord Vader. I have a mission for you. I sent my Hand, Mara Jade, to a planet in the outer rim.

Two of my Dark Jedi had been stationed on Korriban and have seemed to have gone rouge. They have now allied with a person

going by the name 'Lord Voldemort'. I sent Mara to this 'Earth' to subdue them. I knew very well that she probably would be

defeated, but I wanted to test her. Now it has been two weeks since she departed and I have received nothing, not one single report.

I believe that she was ambushed at the landing zone and is now held prisoner.

"You are to go to that planet, recover Mara, and kill the 'Lord Voldemort' and the two Dark Jedi. I do not care how you do it, ally

with their opponents for all I care, but I want them and all they stand for destroyed. Is that clear?"

"Yes, my Lord," replied Vader.

"Good. Take a contingent of Stormtroopers and a Lambda-class shuttle. I trust that will be enough?"

"Yes, my master."

"If you need more men, simply com back and request more. Do not be ashamed, we have no idea what we are facing, the planet is

too remote. You are much too valuable to me for you to die because your pride wouldn't let you ask for help."

"Yes, my Lord."

"Now go, and bring victory and glory to the Empire!"

Vader left. Deep down in the belly of the control room, a little recording device clipped on a wire received the video feed from the

security camera. A miniature timer told it that it was time for its routine info transmission to its masters. With one clear, encrypted

signal it sent a file containing six months worth of conversation to a small asteroid transmitter/receiver. The transmitter/receiver in turn

relayed the file to a small ship even further out. The ship received the message and made a jump to hyperspace.

Even further down in bowls of the control room a droid standing at a workstation registered the small unauthorized transmission and

reported it to a sleepy headed human who ran a systems check. Finding nothing, he walked to the cluster of wires indicated by the

droid and peered inside. He instantly saw the little device and ran a scan over it, then reached for it. The second his hand came within

range the miniature device activated a small proton charge, ripping apart the cluster of wires and burning the man's hand almost to the

bone. Instantaneously twenty other devices around the room self destructed, destroying as many vital cables as they could. The lights

went out, the computers crashed, the security network deactivated. Pandemonium ensued. Three agents had been waiting for this

exact instant. They dashed as far towards the throne room as they could without looking suspicious. At those points they placed

highly destructive Class-A Baradium Thermal detonators; one per person. Checking their backs the three hurried away leaving the

detonators ticking ominously.

Most of the personnel had evacuated the building when the Detonators exploded. The inside was blasted though the outside, and the

building started to topple. Just as they had expected, their blasts triggered the secret self-destruct feature, a massive proton bomb.

The resulting detonation destroyed an entire wing of the Imperial Palace, throne room and all. The agents waited with baited breath;

unfortunately they were disappointed when three Shuttles were seen flying away from the wreckage. If those ships had been

anywhere near the resulting blasts they would have been utterly vaporized; since they were still flying, it was obvious that they had

already been fueled and ready to fly.

One ship turned and headed for the atmosphere, leaving the planet, the other landed on a different wing of the Palace, presumably

they were government officials who had been ushered to the ship by their bodyguards. There was still a scrap of hope that the

Emperor had been killed; but no, the third ship was heading for the crowd with its loudspeakers on.

"People of the Empire," hissed the spiteful voice of the Emperor himself. "Some cowardly villains have attempted a dastardly plan to

kill your leader today, but I am proud to say that yet again they have failed. Make no mistake; they will be found and punished. I urge

you, go back to your business, Coruscant Security will sort the matter out."

Indeed, the red-armored Stormtroopers of the Coruscant Home Defense Force were already deploying in massive numbers while the

ship carrying the Emperor turned to outer space and headed for a Star Destroyer in orbit.

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	6. Chapter 6: Deals and Dark Fleets

**Disclaimer: I don't own Jason Bourne, Hardy Boys, Lord of the Rings, StarGate, StarGate SG-1, StarGate Atlantis, Star Trek, Harry Potter, or Star Wars.**

**(Author's note: I, unfortunately, have never seen the Stargate television episodes. I have, however, seen the movie and read the books by ****Bill McCay. I realize that they are not exactly canon, and I wish I could see the shows, but you get what you get. Just read it!)**

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**Section 6**

Admiral Ackbar turned away from the briefing table aboard the 'Home One' to face the nervous messenger. "What is it?" he asked

in his characteristic bubbly voice.

The intern looked nervous enough to panic. It was evident that he rarely addressed someone as high ranking as Ackbar, even in the

Alliance. "Sir," he stumbled. "We have just received a communiqué from a certain species in the unknown reigons."

Akbar frowned, or at least came as close to it as a Mon Calamirian could. "Chiss Space?" he asked.

"No sir," replied the courier. "This is a totally different species. The have been oppressed by their masters for the last few millennia

and wish to be free of their burden. They are offering to supply soldiers to our cause in return for a liberation attempt."

Ackbar was curious. "Do they have ships?"

"No, sir, their masters oppressed the construction of star-going vessels. Apparently this Ra, the leader, destroyed all but a few of his

ships after he had taken over one thousand inhabitable planets."

This puzzled Ackbar. "How was he supposed to govern his planets without transportation?"

"Through the means of a mysterious power; the Stargate. Instantaneous matter transmission through the ring to any other Stargate in

the galaxy. Unfortunately, the Stargates are only big enough to fit armies through, not space navies. There are rumors of larger ones

known as 'Supergates', but these claims are unconfirmed."

"So these...what did you call them?"

"I didn't sir, but they are known as the Setim. They are willing to trade soldiers and immense technological knowledge in exchange for

a liberation attempt."

"How did we contact them?" asked the admiral.

"We were scouting for a new base and decided to try a planet in the unknown regions; when we landed on a suitable planet, we

found these aliens locked in a struggle for supremacy with their rulers. After some initial pondering, we joined in and their opponents

were quickly defeated. As a result, they offered us their deal and the planet as a base."

"Tell them we accept."

"We do?"

"Yes. I have new information that will be needed to act upon immediately, and we will need all the personal and munitions we can

obtain. Did they send an envoy?"

"Yes, sir, twenty armed troopers, they say that if we accept, these troopers will be instantly assimilated into our command structure."

"How good are they?"

"We tested them sir, and while they were using their own weapons they were pretty good. Unfortunately they were using some sort of

primitive blast weapon they call a 'Blast Lance'. We gave them blasters and they were amazed at the destructive power of such a

weapon."

"How did they do?"

"They were amazing sir; they could be the best fighters we have. I figured that if they are used to such big weapons as their blast

lances, they could be equipped with some of our heavier blasters and be classified as heavy infantry. They would be better than our

existing forces."

Ackbar nodded. "That is very good. Thank you. Equip them with our heaviest blaster rifles and give them as much training as you can

in twenty-four hours. Tell them that we would like to use them in a long-range mission tomorrow. Dismissed."

The messenger saluted and marched away. Ackbar turned back to the table and faced the man on the other side. Just as he was

about to begin speaking a figure clad entirely in black dashed in.

"You called for me sir?"

"Ah, yes, Colonel Skywalker; I have an important job for you."

"I'm not doing anything right now, I ready for anything. What do you want sir?"

"I'll tell you in a minute, first I must introduce you to Talon Karrde. He brokers information. Due to an unfortunate run-in with

Imperials he is now willing to sell us the location of the Katana Fleet."

Luke grabbed the back of the chair in front of him.

"The Katana Fleet? But isn't that a myth?"

"No it's not; two hundred Rendili Stardrive Heavy Dreadnaughts actually disappeared a few years before the Clone Wars. They

were Rendili's best chance for a big shot at Republic military contracts. When the dreadnaughts disappeared Rendili stocks took a

heavy hit and all they could get was small contracts to make small ships. They made dreadnaughts every now and then, but not in the

numbers they had wanted. If things had turned out right the main battleships now would be massive dreadnaughts instead of Star

Destroyers."

"Did they get paid?" broke in Talon Karrde.

"Excuse me; what?" asked Ackbar.

"Did they get paid for the two hundred dreadnaughts?" inquired Karrde again.

Ackbar looked at Luke. Luke shrugged. Ackbar looked uncomfortable.

"I believe so," he said. "They were already in the employ of the Grand Army of the Rebpublic: the volunteer corps. Close to several

thousand men caught the hive virus. Anyway, the Republic had probably already paid."

"Good," said Karrde. "I don't want to get caught in the middle of some big dispute on payment."

"Well," said Luke. "Where are they?"

"Wow, wow, wow!" stammered Karrde. "That's not how it works, kid. First you gotta convince me that you guys are the best

person to tell where the fleet is; then you have to pay me half; then I tell you where it is; then you pay me the other half; and finally I

give you the coordinates. Then you give me a tip."

"Tip? What kind of tip?" asked Luke with no little confusion.

"Tip, you know, like you give a waiter in a restaurant. A couple thousand credits, a new technology you've developed, a fighter, a

bomber?" He looked at Ackbar hopefully. Ackbar sadly shook his head.

"Sorry, we don't have anything like that; firstly we don't have many credits, and we don't have time for new technologys, what with

the war and all. We barely can spare enough to pay your price on the coordinates."

Karrde leapt up with his hand outstretched. "Perfect!" he exclaimed. "You're just the people I've been looking for! Let's get to

work."

Ackbar passed over a credit chip containing ten thousand credits.

Karrde coughed and told them were the ships were. Which, as he had expected, was not of any help to the Rebels; the location was

in the dark of interstellar space, un-findable except by pure luck. Ackbar slid over the next credit chip. For a full minute Karrde

looked at it. If he accepted it would be an end to an era; by selling this information, he would be losing the only reason that the

Imperials hadn't killed him in the two times they had managed to detain him.

He slid the datacard with the coordinates to Ackbar and grabbed the two credit chips.

"Do you want me to come with you to locate these ships?" he asked.

"That won't be necessary," replied Ackbar.

Karrde looked measuringly at Luke and the admiral.

"Now that I have just sold you those coordinates I have lost the one bargaining chip that kept me and my people alive. Now that it's

gone, I request that my organization be absorbed into the Rebel Alliance. They would all have to be given ranks according to their

present positions and I would have to be an admiral. I would personally command my own men and we would be classified as our

own fleet, but in the service of the Rebel Alliance."

Luke glared at him. "So basically your organization would be exactly the same as it is now, but the Alliance would be footing the bill?"

"In a manner of speaking, yes."

Ackbar spoke up. "Deal."

Luke looked at him. " You have the authority to do that?"

"I have the authority to do anything pertaining to the military section of the Alliance. Anything else and I have to consult with Garm

and Mon Mothma.

Anyway the reason I called you here was to inform you of your next mission."

Karrde started to rise. "Should I leave?"

Ackbar stared at him with his large fish-like eyes. "Why should you? You are now an admiral; you have the security clearance to hear

this."

Karrde sat back down. "Yeah, right. I forgot. Does my new position give me the same authorities powers as you?"

Ackbar smiled. "It would, if I wasn't the Grand Admiral of the entire fleet."

With a frown Karrde asked, "Wasn't it only the Empire that has Grand Admirals?"

"Now the Alliance has one."

"Wow."

Turning back to Luke, Ackbar began to speak. "Our intelligence network has informed us that Darth Vader will be going on a

mission personally to a virtually unimportant planet. This planet is in a rather tricky section of the galaxy and he will be going to try and

accomplish the mission as quickly as possible with as few men as he can. If the mission is not completed in a certain amount of time,

the Emperor is going to send back-up, in the form of a planetary occupation fleet."

"Two Star Destroyers and numerous ground forces?"

"Yes. Until that time, Vader will be accompanied only by a platoon of stormtroopers. I want you to go to this planet and kill Vader.

This could be our best chance to eliminate that man. Will you do it?"

"Well," hesitated Luke. "He nearly killed me on Bespin, and he will be accompanied. I don't know…"

"I was planning on sending a platoon of Plex Soldiers with you, but I changed my mind about that. Also, you have greatly progressed

in your skills, even though your master is dead."

"I know, I know; but it could be a struggle. I mean, I haven't even fought Vader since the Cloud City Duel, and that was years ago."

"We realize that, but you are our best hope."

"I have been training and going on missions for years, it's just that I'm not sure if I'm ready to go up against a fully-fledged Sith Lord.

And did you say you weren't going to send the Plex Soldiers? Without them I probably don't stand much of a chance."

"I was going to send the Plex Troopers, but we now have something better," replied Ackbar. "A formerly un-contacted race know as

the Setim have opened negotiations and have supplied us with unparallel fighters; one whole platoon, and they are fully trained

warriors capable of wielding our heaviest blast rifles without a flinch. That's because their original weapons were a little backward in

technology and were very heavy, very complicated, and very big. We simply gave them our weapons that were the same size and

their destructive capacity was increased a hundred fold. Normally I wouldn't use such new troops on such an important mission, but

they will definitely even the odds between you and Vader. We put them in a couple of simulators, and those stormtroopers won't

stand a chance. Are you willing?"

Luke held out his hand. "Sure."

Ackbar placed another datachip containing coordinates on Luke's hand. "Thank you," he rasped. "We'll be getting the Katana Fleet

ready for action and will show up to provide support as soon as possible. The name of the planet is unimportant, but if you want to

know, the inhabitants call it Earth. Many of them, although technologically deficient, are highly qualified warriors, so if you could get a

couple of them to join the rebellion it would be a bonus."

"I'll see what I can do," said Luke, then he left.

* * *

**Well, sorry about the fact that I didn't post any chapters for a while; it was Easter and I suppose you know how busy Eastertime gets. Anyway, what do you think of my story? Please, please, please review! Thanks in advance!**


	7. Chapter 7: Mara Jade, Emperor's Hand

**(Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, Star Wars, James Bond, Alex Rider, StarGate, Stargate SG-1, Stargate Atlantis, Star Trek, Space Balls, Teletubbies, etc. it really is disheartening to look over this list, I mean, look at all that stuff I don't own!)**

**

* * *

**

**Section 7 **

Mara was waiting in her cell. As far as she could tell, it had been three days without any contact whatsoever with anyone. They had

not even brought food or water. She was already dehydrated and knew that if she did not receive any liquids within a few hours, she

was probably going to faint and then die. She had been sleeping as much as possible in order to accomplish a number of things. First,

she wanted to help her body heal; secondly, she had been trying to conserve her energy, so as not to expend needless calories or

water in pointless wakefulness; and thirdly she was trying to keep from going insane. Unfortunately there is a limit to how long a

person can sleep in a day, and she was simply not tired anymore. If she had been a better Jedi, she could have placed herself in a

healing trance and remained there for as long as she liked. That would have fixed her body up and lessened her need for nourishment

of any kind. She wouldn't even need to breathe much. That was very good for extended waits. What stank was that Palpatine hadn't

taught her that technique yet. He had shown her how to gain more energy from a shorter sleep, but that wasn't what she wanted.

Just as she was about to faint, the door to her cell opened and Voldemort stepped in. He had a bowl and a rag in his hand. When he

saw her lying pale on the bed he hurried to her side and placed the wet rag on her forehead.

"My dear," he whispered. "How horrible! I didn't ask for them to do this, they just forgot about you. I only learned the truth after I

had questioned them thoroughly; I assure you, someone will pay for this."

He took the rag off her forehead and dipped it in the bowl of water, and then he let water droplets fall from the rag onto her lips,

slowly moistening them. Little by little, he revitalized her, taking as long as possible. Finally he handed the bowl to her and she drank

greedily.

"Careful, my dear; if you drink to quickly you might get cramps."

Mara ignored him. Finally he left and shut the door. Voldemort turned to Crabbe who was standing just outside. He nodded.

"It's working. Now go get yourself lost; I don't need your help anymore."

Crabbe smiled and hurried off. Voldemort move down the corridor a small distance and turned to face the wall.

"AVADA KEDAVRA!" he yelled. Stone chips flew everywhere as the spell impacted and failed to penetrate. The green light from

the spell was easily visible to Mara where she lay. She felt oddly uneasy. Somewhere, sometime, she had heard those words and

seen that light; she just couldn't remember. It was an uncomfortable feeling, for some reason, her brain was telling her that someone

was probably dead.

It didn't really matter; however, the Emperor killed his subordinates as a matter of course. Even so, why did she feel so strange about

it? Compassion was something that a good agent really couldn't afford. There was just something about this place that was changing

her. Something about that creature, Voldemort. She was utterly repulsed by him, and more surprisingly, she realized that he was

almost exactly like her emperor. A little less cunning, more active, less powerful, a good deal stupider, but all in all, his personality

was almost a match for Palpatine. What was going on here?

* * *

**"He who controls the past controls that present, and he who controls the present controls the future." Orwell, 1984.**

**Anyone ever read that book?**

**How about the Simarillion by JRR Tolkien?**

**You know, I've seen people beg their readers to review by "clicking the little purple button". I have no idea what they are talking about; on my computer the color is definitley light blue. **

**PRESS THE LIGHT BLUE BUTTON AND REVIEW PLEASE!**


	8. Chapter 8:Secret Weapons & Stupid Dances

**(Disclaimer: Look, if I owned it, I would be rich and I probably wouldn't be writing this story)**

**Chapter 8**

Harry strode to the one area in headquarters that a person could disapperate. This place was one way; you could leave, but you couldn't get back in. He stood in the center of the blue ring and prepared for the uncomfortable feeling of this method of transportation; then he did it. He ended up in Siberia. He frowned. It wasn't like him to apperate in the wrong place. Where the heck was he? Then he remembered. The new training grounds had been placed right here; 500 feet directly beneath him. They had been moved on Harry's orders. He pulled out his wand and stuck it in the ground, point first. He steeled himself, than realized that there was no way he was going to not have to do it, and began. As part of the security measures, they hadn't had much time to set up the system here, so Harry had devised an almost foolproof method of entry: to access the keyhole, you had to do the Chicken Dance. It was stupid Harry knew; but the worst was yet to come: he had to vocalize it; that was an integral part of the password. If you didn't do it, twelve concealed 50 mm. Howitzers would open fire and devastate the surrounding countryside. It wouldn't have been so bad it there hadn't have been about twenty hidden cameras in the surrounding landscape, broadcasting their images to every Order control center in the world to be displayed on 72 in, High Definition plasma TVs using Bosse HD Surround Sound with twelve speakers. The microphone somewhere nearby would record his voice in all its horrible tone and pitch; the humiliation would be almost unbearable. Harry had known this when he had set it up. He knew that no self respecting Death Eater would perform the Chicken Dance; he knew also that his subordinates wouldn't tell anyone about the location because of the humiliation factor. Harry hadn't ever expected to do it; he wasn't planning on coming back. However, here he was and now he had to. That stank.

He started to dance and sing. The motion sensors tracked him and established that he was performing the correct motions. The audio sensors were having a little difficulty. They could tell that the words were being said, but they weren't in any recognizable tune; it was a good thing that the sensors had been recalibrated, the AI had accidentally shot several members of the Order because it didn't realize that they were actually trying to sing. If those sensors had have had their settings adjusted, they would have already called in for a nuclear strike; Harry's voice was threatening to access notes never before heard by still-living beings. Finally he completed the song and said the second password.

"Say goodnight, Peter Panda." He had come up with that one after he saw 'THE PACIFIER'. A pole slid out of the ground and Harry put his key in the keyhole and the ground opened up beneath him. He fell fifteen feet straight down, and then he bounced five feet up. After he came to rest, he saw the targeting lasers of four different rifles. He held out his wand and threw it towards the nearest guard. The man grabbed the wand, stuffed it into a bag, then he motion Harry forward. Harry walked down the corridor with his hands on his head. Another guard came out of a concealed room and followed him. Finally Harry came to a large chamber. The guard shoved Harry and then went back to his room. A man hurried across to Harry.

"Director Potter! I did not know that you were going to come so soon! I thought we were supposed to bring them to you, not you come to us! How's the war going? They're not completely finished yet, but we can schedule a demonstration. How's that nice girl, whats-her-name…Hermione?"

Harry held up his hand to stop the flood of questions. "One at a time, Doctor, one at a time. The war is not going well. A new force has shown its face and now there are two invincible men fighting for Voldemort."

"They won't be invincible for long! Not after we activate 'them'!" interjected Doctor Paul.

"That's the thing; I need them now. How ready are they?"

Dr. Paul looked worried. "They really shouldn't be activated for another five months, Director."

"That's bad. I need them. Without them we don't have a chance. I fear that if we wait for the necessary five months there won't be anyone to save. Could we use them now?"

"I think that you could, but they won't be as powerful as they could be…"

"Let's go look," said Harry.

"Wait, wait, wait!" stammered the little man.

"What's the problem?" asked Harry irritably. He didn't come all this way simply to find out that he couldn't even see the Secret Weapons.

"If we disturb them we might disrupt their delicate learning matrices. Who knows what might happen if they are programmed wrong!"

"Fine. But I want them ready within the week. Is there any way I can see them while I'm here?

"We'll step up their learning processes in hopes of getting more information into them. I think that we can safely look in on them from the observation room. Let's go."

The two walked off down the sloping corridor in complete silence. Finally they arrived at a small conference room; probably large enough to fit ten people. There was a plexi-glass window to one and of the room and it was to this that the two headed. Harry stared down into the huge cavern that stretched out below him

* * *

**A/N: I did not add the part about Harry doing the Chicken Dance to be funny. On the contrary; I actually wanted to include it because the humiliation would make a good security measure. I am decidly un-funny, so don't dismiss that passage as a weak attempt at humor, because it isn't. Take it as a security that only the very dumb or the very smart could bring themselves to perform. Death Eaters don't fall into either catagory. (Except for C. & G., who wouldn't think of it in the first place.) Thank You.**


	9. Chapter 9:Big Blasters and Broken Hearts

**(Disclaimer: I don't own this. Or that. For that matter, I don't own that either…)**

**9**

Luke was inspecting his troops; fifty of these strange new races of aliens known as the Setim were standing at attention in front of him. Normally he wouldn't depend upon such new troops, but this was supposed to by a covert mission: go in, kill Darth Vader, get out. Simple. In theory. All he needed these guys for was backup; he would be doing the hard work. Han would be taking them in; the Millennium Falcon, as a smuggling ship, naturally was stealthier than the bulky cruisers used by the Alliance. It would be an uncomfortable ride, but the Setim were used to rides of that kind; apparently the Stargate passage felt like crashing into a planet's surface in an X-wing. Without the inertia compensators.

Whatever. These guys certainly could use their weapons, and the weapons were huge indeed. They had been outfitted with arms from a stash of weaponry the Rebels had managed to 'liberate' from an Imperial Garrison. Quite a few were sporting Z-6 Rotary Blasters. The Z-6 used a rotating multiple barrel assembly to bypass the refresh lag inherent in the galven circuitry that lined the barrels of blaster weaponry. Galven circuitry collimated the excited plasma charging through a blaster. The conductive circuitry refined the plasma into the discreet "bolts" that emerged from the barrel. Galven circuitry had practical limits to its exposure to energetic plasma, which dictate a weapon's fire rate. Too much exposure led to damaged circuitry, resulting in entire barrels needing to be replaced after overheating. The Z-6 worked around this limitation by incorporating six barrels in rapid rotation, each with alternating galven channels, with the whole assembly wrapped around a coolant-lined core. The alternating galven channels result in longer barrels, but only half of that barrel length had its galven circuitry active with each shot. Furthermore, the time it took for a barrel to make two rotations is enough to allow the galven circuitry to cool to acceptable levels. This meant that the Z-6 had a tremendous rate of fire, maxing out at a tremendous 166 rounds per second.

These weapons had been manufactured by the Old Republic during the Clone Wars for a short time, but the Empire had discontinued the line because the weapons were too darned heavy for a normal trooper to use. Unfortunately the rebels had the same problem; only about ten of their men were big enough to actually use the massive blasters. Looking at the muscles on the catlike aliens, Luke figured that the Setim wouldn't have the same problem.

Some were holding Merr-Sonn Reciprocating Quad Blasters, also known as Cip-Quads. The Cip-Quad transformed a single soldier into a mobile piece of anti-personnel and anti-armor blaster artillery. The quad blaster was mounted on an articulated and powered harness, fitted with microrepulsorlift buoyancy cells that helped reduce the overall weight of the heavy cannon. The four twin-barreled cannons drew power from a heavy duty backpack-mounted power cell. The sleeved barrels vented excess heat with each recoil, drawing coolant from a built-in tank with each barrel's return. Each double-barrel fired one at a time, or two at a time, following a rotation pattern selected by the gunner. These amazing weapons suffered from the same problem as the Z-6; they were just too enormous to be used for long periods of time. In the Rebellion, sometimes the success of the mission depended on having small weapons that could be easily carried.

The other five Setim were bearing what Luke could have sworn were E-Web Heavy Repeating Blasters with their tripods and a good foot of the barrel sawn off. Luke didn't look too closely; the mechanics were notoriously violent when someone criticized their work. If those were truly E-webs, they would be formidable weapons; even starfighter pilots watched out for troops using E-Webs.

Luke smiled. Even if these troops were completely fresh and had never seen combat, they were a formidable force; their weapons alone greatly out massed the stormtroopers' supplies.

The small landing force climbed aboard the Millennium Falcon, the aliens looking around in wonder. Their leader had earlier informed Luke that although they had worked aboard space-going ships, Ra kept only three that actually were operational. After he had formed his empire, he had placed the Stargates on each of his planets and destroyed his space fleet. This made no tactical sense, but obviously Ra wanted to prevent an uprising and clearly thought that his section of the galaxy was the only part that was inhabited. He could have been a formidable opponent, powerful enough to challenge Palpatine had he kept the fleet; his empire stretched nearly as far as Palpatine's, the difference was that Palpatine was smart enough to use all his resources. He also had hyperdrive. Ra, apparently, didn't.

To this mission, however, the history of the empires of the galaxy was of no consequence. Han Solo entered his ship last, directed his passengers to their locations, and then lifted the YT-1400 light transport freighter off of the hangar floor.

The rest of the ride was uneventful, right down to the boring landing on the planet earth. They unloaded their arms and armor and got out the only speedbike they were allowed to bring. Finally they got out a small scanning device and some armor plates. They dug a few fortifications and placed the platting in front.

With a casual salute Han climbed the ramp into the Falcon and lifted off. Now the small army was all alone. Luke activated the scanning machine. He lay back and ordered his men to relax, which they did, entertaining themselves as best as possible. They couldn't do anything until the scanner figured out where on the planet they were and where D. Vader was going to show up.

Sometime around one o'clock in the morning Luke was awaked by a small beep and a steady blinking light on the scanner. He turned on the datapad that was connected to the machine and looked at the screen. He knew that he should probably keep com silence, but the scanner didn't register any imperial signals, and the name on the screen called to him; he wanted to talk to her so badly, ever since the Death Seed incident he had desperately wanted to hear her thoughts.

_Callista_

Finally the blinking light was too much to resist. He poked the red button and a message screen flared to life. The transmission file was too large for a simple text, or even a recorded message. Callista actually wanted to talk to him face to face!

Her beautiful face showed up on the screen.

"Hi, Luke," she said uncomfortably. Luke remembered that at their last meeting, while it had not gone bad, Callista had stated in no uncertain words that she wanted to think things through herself, alone; during the Eye of Palpatine incident she had transferred her consciousness to another body, the body of Cray the brilliant AI programmer. Cray's fiancée had suffered from a terminal illness and Cray had attempted to program him into a droid. She had come to terms with the fact that Nichos, her fiancée was no longer alive all that remained was a droid programmed to act like him, onboard the massive battlestation 'Eye of Palpatine'. She helped set the Eye for destruction, but the last seconds required that two people stay behind to manage the final end. Cray stayed but had offered her body to Callista, who, twenty years before had sacrificed herself to stop the Eye for a while; Callista had used a force technique to transfer her mind to the computers of the Eye just before her body died. Cray said that if she wasn't able to be with the one she loved, at least someone could. In the remaining minutes the two used the same technique to transfer at the same time; Callista into Cray's body, and Cray into the computer. Unfortunately the change was not without a price. Callista had discovered that she could no longer use the force. Distraught by this change she had fled into the galaxy desperately trying to reconcile with the fact that she could no longer use a power she had had since she was a little girl.

Now she was speaking to him again. Luke wondered what she had to say.

"Hi, Callista," he replied.

"Umm, Luke, I'm sorry about the way I've acted over the last year or so…"

"It's okay. I understand that you needed to be alone to work out your thoughts; it just hurts a little," he responded.

She looked up into his eyes. "I regained a small amount of connection to the force, Luke, though it took a long and painful road to find it. I'd like to come to you as student; perhaps you can help me make the connection stronger."

Luke looked hard into the holographic image. "Callista, can it ever be the same between us?" he asked, though to say it felt like sandpaper was being dragged through his insides.

She looked down again, not fast enough to hide the pain in her eyes; however the effort was in vain, for her voice declared what she did not want her face to show.

"I'm really sorry; my journey has changed me, it will never be the same. I need you as a teacher, though; please help me."

Luke sat up. "Sure, Callista, I'd love to, except I'm on a mission right now-"

Callista broke in. "What planet are you on?"

Luke told her. She asked for coordinates, he gave them to her; then he tried to say something.

"Callista, I'm on a mission right now; I might have to fight Vader. We're on a technologically backwards planet and-"

She interrupted again.

"Well, I'll see you then, Luke." She signed off.

Luke sat back and sighed. He suddenly felt that he probably shouldn't have given her the coordinates. It was too late now. He sighed again and stood up to relive the sentry on duty.


	10. Chapter 10: StarGates and Space Invaders

**(Disclaimer: Seriously, would I be writing this if I owned it?)**

**10**

Scientist Dr. Daniel Jackson slammed his fist down onto his desk as hard as he possibly could. Those stupid quasi-magicians had taken over the Gaza spiral! He had requested a simple expedition to excavate and examine the Gaza pyramids. The unique shape and placement of the pyramids seemed to him to be either a special alignment or a signpost of sorts. All he had wanted to do was look and analyze. However, the big-cheeses in the pentagon had repeatedly refused his requests. After a while of snooping around he had discovered that a new organization had arisen in England, claiming that some psychopathic killer was running loose attempting to take over the world. Apparently this man was too dangerous for the armed forces to take care of and the governments of the world should supply them with food, ammo, men, and money.

Daniel had inside information that Hathor, the fearful leader of the remnants of Ra's Empire, was going to blast the earth into a ball of molten rock in less than a year; but the head-honchos in the White House were ignoring him, an almost respectable archeologist with a degree, and giving all their money to a bunch of wierdos in cloaks who had just come out of hiding two years ago. At least that was what he thought for a few days. The officers had been told to withhold certain information from him, probably because they knew what his reaction would be. They were entirely right. Daniel had utilized certain sources to find out what he wanted to know, and when he had, he exploded.

Those "wizards" were even now sitting on what could be a weapon or a storehouse of technology that could save the world. The government of Egypt had been subverted, bribed, blackmailed, etc. into handing over control of the pyramids to the "wizards". To make matters worse, the "wizards" claimed that their ancestors built the pyramids; Dr. Jackson knew this wasn't true unless they were descended from an ancient space-going race of conquers.

He had begged. He had pleaded. He had threatened (for all the good that that had done him; everyone knew his political power was about nil). Nothing had worked and the wizards had stayed firmly entrenched on the site of what could be the greatest discovery in the history of the world.

It would stay that way until the world was destroyed, Daniel knew. He could start a petition, but by the time it was even processed through the courts, the year would be long up. By about fifty years.

Colonel Jack O'Neil walked into the small office and saluted Jackson.

"Daniel, General West needs you at the StarGate silo immediately. The StarGate has been acting up and we think that there might be someone or something coming through soon."

Daniel looked up, glad for this interruption. "How do you figure?"

"There've been two drones that came through over the past twenty-four hours."

"Drones? What sort of drones?"

O'Neil sighed and sat down. "You remember when we first went through the Stargate?"

"Yeah."

"You remember the robot we sent through the first time and the time before we went to Balas?"

"Yeah."

"That sort of drone. Except these ones float. The first one to come through just peaked out and darted back in. The second one came out with a poster."

"A poster?" asked Daniel smiling.

"A poster. It has writing on it, but we can't read it. Then it projected a hologram onto the floor of a man talking. The video has been looping ever since, and as far as we can tell, has been playing in different languages ever since. Now the StarGate is powering up again, and we think that there might be a live one coming through soon."

Dr. Jackson stood up. "What are we waiting for? Let's go!"

Once the pair made it to the missile silo that housed the Stargate, they were greeted by Lieutenant Ferretti, commander of the Space Marine Corps.

"Hey, Chief. Looks like we're going to have a job. The Stargate just 'kawooshed'.

The 'Kawoosh' was a remarkable side effect of the Stargate's normal operation. (see: Wikipedia entry on the Stargate) A massive swirling vortex would flash out of the front of the Stargate in a spectacular display of power. This phenomena happened just before the inter-dimensional wormhole stabilized and the portal opened. The fact that the 'kawoosh' had just 'kawooshed' proved that someone was definitely operating the Stargate at the other end.

O'Neil leaned out of the Army jeep he was currently driving.

"Are the guards in position? Are the defenses online, Ferretti?"

Ferrari waved his hand vaguely. "Yeah, yeah, Chief. We had them lil' guys fired up first sign of activity. You just get in there. Me and my men have this place under control."

After they made it through the security, Daniel and Jack headed up to the command center where Barbara Shore was waiting anxiously for them.

"Hello, Daniel, O'Neal. You've come just in time. We think that the Stargate portal is opened now. We're just waiting for something to happen."

"Where's the probe?" asked Dr. Jackson.

"We have it right over here, plugged into a computer," she said, leading them over to a computer terminal.

"You plugged it in? But that's not safe! It might have a virus! And how did you plug it into the computer in the first place? It's an alien technology!"

Barbara shrugged. "The computer isn't connected to the network. We just unplugged it from everything except for a mouse, keyboard, power, speakers, and the monitor. The probe itself gave us the plug. It went through several different connections, most of which I've never seen, before it found one that fit the computer. Now it's playing its message over and over in different languages."

Daniel looked at the screen. "I've never seen any of these before."

Something in his voice made the probe sit up. It beeped and twittered.

Jack laughed. "I think it's trying to tell you something, Daniel."

The probe stopped twittering and a message popped up on the screen.

_Species: Human_

_Sub-species: Basic stock_

_Language Selection: Basic_

_Syntax: Basic_

_Accent: Coruscant standard_

_Message: The Rebel Alliance requests a meeting with your officials to discuss matters of Galactic Security and Welfare. Will meet with you in:_

_0 hours; 23 minutes; 42 seconds; 34 milliseconds_

The screen blanked for a minute then a new message popped up:

_Transmitting language data now. Please do not disconnect._

_Signal failed_

_Retry_

_Signal failed_

_System check_

_System check passed_

_Hardware check_

_Hardware check failed for the following reasons:_

_Unable to connect with transmitter_

_Possible maladies: Transmitter broken; transmitter wet; or transmitter otherwise incapacitated._

_Closing Transmission file_

The file closed and the probe hummed into Stand-by mode.

Daniel looked at Barbara. "Has it done this before?" he asked.

She shook her head. "I think that the probe was activated by your voice; none of the technicians have spoken anywhere around it. It probably has some advanced language recognition program to identify our speech. From what it said, I'd have to guess that it was supposed to send confirmation and tell its masters what language we're using."

"That's what I figured too," stated the Colonel.

"What I can't understand is the part where it called us 'basic stock' humans. That's just weird. What else could we be?"

"Martians?" stated O'Neil questioningly.

Daniel just glared at him while Barbara replied, "Martians? On Earth? Not very likely."

Daniel continued as if nothing had been said. "I also couldn't understand the lingo part. We speak English, not 'basic', whatever that is."

O'Neil shrugged, unconcerned. "Whatever it means, we see in a few minutes. That ambassador should be coming through the Stargate soon. I'll tell Ferretti to fire up the defenses. Starting now, no one enters this building or leaves it."


End file.
